Policy Brief - Perfomance Contracts and Social Service ... · perfomance contracts and social service delivery- lessons from rwanda rwfo/adb - march 2012 1 african development bank

PERFOMANCE CONTRACTS AND SOCIAL SERVICE DELIVERY- LESSONS FROM RWANDA RWFO/ADB - MARCH 2012

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AFRICAN DEVELOPMENT BANK

RWANDA FIELD OFFICE

AND SOCIAL SERVICE DELIVERY- LESSONS FROM RWANDA

PERFOMANCE CONTRACTS

RWFO

PO

LICY

BRI

EF -

MA

RCH

201

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Table of contents

1.0 INTRODUCTION 5

I. Background 5

II. History of IMIHIGO. 6

III IMIHIGO and national planning system 7

IV. Key outcomes 9

V. Challenges 11

VI. Lessons 12

VII. REFERENCES 13


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List of acronyms

AGI – African Governance initiative

DDP – District Development Plans

EDPRS – Economic Development and Poverty Reduction

Strategy

GDP – Gross Domestic Product

GOR – Government of Rwanda

JADF – Joint Action Development Forum

M & E – Monitoring and evaluation

MDG – Millennium Development Goal

MINECOFIN – Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning

MTEF – Medium Term Expenditure Framework

PRSP – Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper

SACCOs – Savings and Credit Cooperative Organizations

SSP – Sector Strategic Plans

SWG – Sector Working Group


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Acknowledgements

The brief was prepared by Bernis Byamukama under the overall guidance of Negatu Makonnen, Resident Representative RWFO. Edward Sennoga, RWFO Country Economist, provided useful comments and suggestions. Ejide Rugamba, Director General in the Ministry of Local Government, also provided comments to earlier drafts.


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INTRODUCTION

i. Background

1. Rwanda experienced one of the most violent conflicts of the 20th century but has recovered and is making sig-nificant progress towards reconciliation, reconstruction and development. This prog-ress has been the result of a combination of good leader-ship, development partner support, national ownership, and innovative approaches to governance.

The use of Rwanda’s indig-enous knowledge system, known as Imihigo (perfor-mance contracts), is one of those innovative and home-grown approaches that has strengthened service deliv-ery and contributed signifi-cantly to improvements in the

socio economic well being of citizens.

2.This brief explores the con-tribution of Imihigo to im-provements in social service delivery in Rwanda and exam-ines its challenges and oppor-tunities.

The brief is organized as fol-lows: Section (ii) reviews the history of Imihigo in Rwanda’s traditional past, section (iii) describes how it has been adapted in the national plan-ning system and section (iv) documents the key devel-opment outcomes attained at local government and na-tional levels as a result of in-stitutionalizing performance contracts in the planning pro-cesses. Section (v) discusses the challenges of Imihigo and

Judges signing Imihigo with President Kagame.


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section (vi) highlights the les-sons learnt.

ii. The history of IMIHIGO

3. “Imihigo” is a Kinyarwanda word, meaning the setting of goals upon which “Kwesa imihigo” (evaluation) will be conducted at a future point in time. Imihigo is founded on the old Rwandan cultural practice whereby two parties publicly committed them-selves to the achievement of a particularly demanding task. Failing to meet these commit-ments usually led to dishonor, not only to the participating individuals but to the com-munity as a whole. Those who achieved their pledges became role models in the community, and their exploits were echoed in history.

4. Imihigo also included an element of evaluation: a pub-lic ceremony was usually or-ganized to facilitate the dis-semination of outcomes of an agreed upon undertaking to the community. People’s courage, bravery and hard work set examples which others were usually encour-aged to emulate. The spirit of Imihigo in the Rwandan cul-tural context therefore em-bodies the principles of set-ting ambitious goals that re-quire commitment to action and personal responsibility, reciprocity of obligations and mutual respect between high-

er and lower ranks, higher moral values and patriotism, competition to achieve the best results and evaluation of the out-comes.

5. The Government of Rwan-da (GoR) introduced Imihigo as a performance based man-agement tool to strengthen strategic planning and man-agement and improve service delivery in the Local Gov-ernment system. During the design of the Economic De-velopment and Poverty Re-duction Strategy (EDPRS) in 2006, performance contracts were fully adopted as a criti-cal tool to create efficiency in EDPRS implementation and to improve the quality of pub-lic service delivery.

6. The idea of introducing Im-ihigo into the national plan-ning framework of EDPRS emanates from the evalu-ations of the first phase of Rwanda’s Poverty Reduction Strategy (PRSP: 2003-2005), which revealed that weak-nesses in policy coordination, and monitoring and evalua-tion contributed to margin-al impact on poverty reduc-tion. For instance, poverty declined from 58.9% in 2000 to 56.7% in2005/6, casting serious doubt on the achieve-ment of the MDGS target of 30%.

7.The evaluation of the PRSP also revealed that the M & E


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system contained insufficient tools to monitor perfor-mance. Moreover, activities were not well prioritized, se-quenced and targeted within sectors and between differ-ent levels of government.

8. The relationships of ac-countability between ser-vice providers and citizens were not also well defined, and citizens’ participation in decision making at all levels of public administration was not well coordinated. Draw-ing from the recommenda-tions of the PRSP evaluation process, the GOR and its partners convened a year-long dialogue in 2006.The discussion culminated in, among other things, institu-tionalizing performance con-tracts in the central and Local Government planning system in order to increase the rate and quality of the execution of government programs and priorities. Imihigo is now inte-grated into the national plan-ning system via the EDPRS Sector Strategic Plans (SSP) and District Development Plans (DDPs).

iii. Imihigo and national planning system

9. Line ministries, public agen-cies and districts are required each year to sign formal pub-lic service agreements to deliver key specific outputs. The activities to be included

in the performance contracts are derived from the SSPs, and DDPs, Cabinet resolu-tions, leadership retreats and through grassroots consulta-tions. The policy actions are clustered in three broad cate-gories of social welfare, good governance and economic development, and they must be high priority programs. The remaining routine actions are considered in the district development plans. Attention is given to key issues of pub-lic service delivery, including issues with a greater impact on community well being and public finance management.

10. The process begins with grassroots consultations which take place at the lowest level of administrative hierarchy, known as Umudu-

Citizens participate in public works(Umuganda). Grassroot consultations take place within this forum.


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gudu (village). In a community public works event (Umu-ganda), citizens are asked to identify the activities they consider to be the priorities for their socio economic well-being. The village leaders sub-mit citizens’ priorities to the next administrative level - the Akagari (cell), where all of the respective village proposals are consolidated and submit-ted to the next level called the Umurenge (sector)1. At this level, a committee known as the Joint Action Development Forum2 undertakes a careful selection and filtering of ideas to ensure that the sector pri-orities mirror national and lo-cal ones. The pre screened priorities are then consolidat-ed at the district level and are matched with the resource envelope. The final set of performance targets for the upcoming fiscal year is dis-cussed and approved by the district leadership. Following the completion of the grass-roots and Local Government consultations, all districts par-ticipate in a ceremony during which the previous financial year’s targets and perfor-mance are appraised (Kwesa imihigo) and the performance contracts for the upcom-ing year are signed with H.E. President Kagame. The top three mayors are rewarded for their exemplary achieve-ments, and the top ten may-ors get a chance to take a group photo with the guest of

honor. The rest of the mayors are encouraged to improve their performance in the next fiscal year, and measures are identified to improve per-formance in the lagging dis-tricts. Following the signing of the national performance contracts,the representatives of the lower administrative units at the sector, cell and village level also draw their performance objectives from the district performance con-tracts and sign performance reviews with their respective leaders in the order of hier-archy.

11. Reporting on Imihigo is done quarterly in line with EDPRS reporting framework. In addition, the district orga-nizes a public accountability day at the end of each quar-ter to disseminate the find-ings and to receive feedback from citizens on the quality of evaluation. This feedback informs measures to sustain improved progress.

12. Finally, an annual evaluation is conducted by the national quality assur-ance team to determine the extent to which districts have achieved their objec-tives and contributed to improvements in the socio economic wellbeing of citi-zens. Table 1 illustrates how the districts’ priorities are set and evaluated. The evalua-tions for 2010/11 show a sig-

1The umurenge (sector level ) is the basic decentralized administrative level below the district, with delegated financial autonomy from the district to implement policies. Rwanda has 416 sectors country-wide. 2The joint action forum is a multilayer platform at the district level (Akarere) or the lower administrative level called sector (umurenge), where the local authorities and CSOs jointly plan and monitor the performance of service delivery.


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nificant improvement in the districts’ capacity to imple-ment government programs because the performance contracts have enabled them to focus on outputs/results rather than routine activities.

The average score for all the 30 districts in the three broad areas of evaluation3 was 81.5% in 2010/11, up from 66.3% in 2009/11. Rul-indo district emerged as the best, with an average score of 90.6%, while Gakenke dis-trict lagged behind, with an average score of 64.4%. Out 30 districts, 29 made posi-tive improvements in per-formance of their targets. Rwamagana district improved most, rising from 52.6% in 2009/10 to 80.2% in 2010/11.

iv. Key outcomes

13. The enhanced creativ-ity and strong focus on results introduced by performance contracts at the district and sector level have translated into significant national devel-opment outcomes (see Table 2).

The most notable examples include: the construction of rural roads, the expansion of access to clean water, com-plete eradication of grass thatched houses through a national campaign called

Table 1: Performance evaluation for (Rulindo) in the 2010/11 selected priority targets Economic growth sector Target achieved %achievedFamilies resettled in community settlement (imidugudu) 4500 4059 90%Homes connected to the electricity grid 400 360.8 90%

Km of feeder roads constructed 34 31 96%Social welfare Number of classrooms built for nine-year basic education 474 422.334 89%Families having access to clean water 400 356.4 89%Cows supplied to poor families under one cow/family program 400 356.4 89%Families with health insurance 100% 89% 89%Strengthening governance 30 sectors supplied with computers 30 21 70%Community mobilized to do public works (umuganda) 98% 91% 93%

Source: Imihigo evaluation report 2010/11 and Rulindo district M&E.

Table 2: Performance evaluation on a selected set of national EDPRS indicators. Economic growth Baseline(2006) Target2012/13 Actual(2011)Share of population living in poverty (%) 57 46 44.9Share of population living in extreme poverty (%) 37 24 24.1Agricultural land protected against soil erosion (%) 40 100 87.3Classified road network in good condition (%) 11 31 59.9Electricity generation (off/on grid, MW) 45 130 97.4Social Population covered by health insurance schemes (%) 70 95 89Access to safe drinking water (% of population) 64 86 74Pupil/teacher ratio in primary schools 70 47 58

Governance Share of population expressing satisfaction in decen-tralised governance (%)

65 70 74.2

Source : EDPRS Lessons Learned (2008 -2011).

An Association of women weaving baskets for sale.

3The district Imihigo are categorized under three broad pillars of economic development, social development and governance in line with the EDPRS flagship programs.


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bye-bye Nyakatisi4, and in-creased agriculture produc-tivity and livestock. The pop-ulation covered by health in-surance schemes increased from 70 % to 89% between 2006 and 2011, and 74.2% of citizens feel that they are actively participating in local decision making and that lo-cal government is listening and addressing their priority concerns, from the baseline of 65% in 2006. These na-tional outcomes have been

achieved because ordinary citizens are given a greater role in policy formulation and evaluation, and officials at all levels are specifically thinking about Imihigo with a focus on results.

v. Challenges

14. The key challenges in the Imihigo planning process include: inadequate skills in monitoring and evaluation, especially at the Local Gov-

A model Village (Umudugudu).

4Bye Bye Nyakatsi was a nationwide campaign conducted in 2010/11 to build permanent metal-roofing houses for poor families through community mobilization. It started as an initiative by the Rwandan diaspora aimed at building a model village for 504 families and was adopted and scaled up based on its success to serve all the vulnerable citizens in Rwanda.


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ernment level. For example, it was observed during the 2010/11 annual evaluations that the M&E frameworks for most of the districts failed to maintain logic and consistency in setting objectives, baseline indicators and outputs/out-comes targets, which made it difficult to measure prog-ress. Other challenges in-clude weakness in data man-agement; limited resources competing against large ex-penditure needs; delays in disbursements, especially in relation to donor funds; weak capacities in procurement planning by districts; and lack of expertise in managing

large contracts, especially in-frastructure related projects. Some districts also reported that frequent changes in lead-ership disrupted implementa-tion progress of some of their key programs and forced do-nors to reallocate funds origi-nally budgeted under their performance contract to oth-er districts.

vi. Lessons learned

15. The performance con-tracts have facilitated prog-ress in the EDPRS implemen-tation by serving to ensure a focus on delivery of results. For example, the signing of

Intore : (Rwanda traditional dancers) imitate how the ritual of uguhiga was done in the past.


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the performance contract by the district mayors in 2010 to begin the implementation of the nine year basic education program spurred the district leaders to mobilize the local community support in con-structing the required class-rooms and allowed the pro-gram to start on schedule.

16. Strong political will is im-portant to ensure the success-ful implementation of perfor-mance contracts. President Kagame’s leadership role in this matter has been exem-plary, and his strong focus on results has inspired the local and national leaders to work towards delivering results.

17. In implementing perfor-mance contracts, quality as-surance services are essential to support the local authori-ties in establishing a proper functioning M&E framework for measuring progress. Qual-ity assurance services are also required to ensure that the priorities identified at the lo-cal level adequately reflect national priorities.

18. The Imihigo planning process has served to im-prove the functions of plan-ning, budgeting and policy review at the local govern-ment level. Districts plans are now designed and imple-mented according to the af-fordable resource envelope, hence ensuring the alignment

of expenditure to expected outputs/outcomes.

19. International donors have played an important role in the Imihigo process, through budget support and technical advice. Constant dialogue and coordination through the JADF has en-hanced the alignment of funding to the national pri-orities.


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REFERENCES

MINECOFIN (2008), National guidelines to planning and MTEF guidelines, Kigali Rwanda.

IMF (2011), Second review under the policy instrument, Rwanda IMF country report no.11/62.

IMF (2011), Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper – Progress report, June 2011, IMF Country Report No. 11/154.

Republic of Rwanda (2010), Strengthening National Planning, 7Th Kivu National leader-ship retreat.

Overseas Development Institute (2011), Mapping progress: evi-dence for a new devel-opment progress, Westminster Bridge road, London SEI 7JD, UK.

Kigali (2011), Districts Imihigo evaluation report 2010-2011 23 July 2011.

Tony Blair African Governance Initiative (2010), Annual report and financial statements.

MINALOC (2010), Concept note on Imihigo planning and evalua-tion, Kigali Rwanda.

MINECOFIN, October 2011 XIV Joint Budget support Review report 2009/2010.

Sarah E. Ryan, October 2008, Building a Capable State Defining Good Governance in Rwanda.

MINALOC (2011), District Imihigo Evaluation Report 2010/2011.

Documents

Policy Brief - Perfomance Contracts and Social Service ... · perfomance contracts and social service delivery- lessons from rwanda rwfo/adb - march 2012 1 african development bank